Of Course I'll Help You With Your Fancy Dress Says Pete Brindle

When northern area sales manager Peter Brindle's daughter Katie told her dad that she wanted to enter the fancy dress at the school fete he was, of course, delighted to offer his help. "So what do you want to go as?" asked Peter. "Tutankhamun" was the response (the kids have been learning about ancient Egypt).

Not one to give up on a challenge, and unable to persuade Katie to choose to be a pyramid like her sister Lucy, Peter got stuck in and together he and the family produced a wonderful (and first prize winning)effort. Here is Katie in just part of her winning outfit.



Fed up with there being nothing on at the local cinema we decided to rent a film on the Apple TV on Saturday evening. Gerard Butler starred in a bizarre vigilante movie in which Butler's character in revenge for the brutal murder of his wife and daughter cuts one of the perpetrators into tiny pieces with a chain saw (making sure that he videos this and sends it to a lawyer's ten year old daughter), blows up half a dozen more justice department people in their cars, suffocates yet another lawyer, blows the judge's brains out and kills his prison cellmate with a violent stabbing attack. The title of the film (and Butler's character) - "Law Abiding Citizen" hmmm.


It's the first episode of the new BBC Antiques show "Antiques Master" this evening on BBC2 at 8.30pm. Regular readers may remember that I was the thirty third choice contestant (out of 32)and spent four pleasant days in May at Towneley Hall in Burnley on the off chance that one of the contestants would be unable to take part. I was allowed to watch the filming of the final episode (when it was clear that I would not be on the show) and I have to say that it looked very good. Give it a try. Maybe I will get a chance if there is another series.


It's a big week for son Paul and daughter-in-law Josephine next week with both of them having new TV series going into production. Marion and I hope to be able to go down and watch the filming of one of each of the shows. We are looking forward to it. It is great to see them both being successful in what must be one of the most difficult career choices there is.

Just been checking out what's new on YouTube. At last.A film that we can look forward to.

He's In A League Of His Own

Here I am presenting Max Vidal with his £100 prize for winning our Guardian Pick The Score League for 2010. Max ran away with the league with 325 points which was some 45 ahead of Jenny who scooped our £50 second prize whilst I took third with 276. Max's performance was quite outstanding and he finished 8th overall in the country out of many thousands of entrants. Well done Max. Would you like to give me some betting tips next season? Spare a thought for last year's winner Tony Lowe. Tony's fantastic record of predicting took a tumble when his own team Burnley somehow found themselves in the Premiership. Being a true clarets fan Tony let his heart rule his head and his persistence in predicting Burnley wins cost his dearly.



Which leads me very neatly to the hidden gem that is Burnley's Towneley Hall. This lovely old building set in parkland on the outskirts of the town is the setting for the BBC's forthcoming new antiques show Antiques Master which is currently in production. 32 contestants are battling it out to be the most knowledgeable amateur antiques enthusiast in the country and win the coveted title of Antiques Master. Unfortunately for me I was the 33rd contestant and I agreed to go to the hall every day for the last four days (that's why there's been no blog - nothing to do with my negotiations with Nick Clegg) just in case one of the chosen few had travel problems or fell ill. Happily (for them) everything went smoothly and they all turned up safe and well although when one young lady arrived with a fourteen week old baby who was being breast fed I thought that my time might have come.



Being used to the self imposed solitary confinement that I have been putting myself through for the last few weeks, the waiting alone was not a big problem although the runners forgot to bring the promised daily newspapers twice leaving me crawling up the walls a couple of times. I had to arrive at 8am and didn't leave until the first round of the show was in the can so it was a ten hour wait on three of the four days. However the assistant producer Nicola kindly agreed to let me sit in the studio for the filming of the final show and that made up for the days of pacing backwards and forwards. It was fascinating to watch the show in production and I think that it will be a big success.




I can't tell you about it as it would spoil things but it has two great presenters in Sandi Toksvig and Eric Knowles. Whilst neither will be blogging about meeting me, both were kind enough to make me extremely welcome and I enjoyed sitting next to Sandi and discussing the political situation with her. I imagine that this week's News Quiz on Friday on Radio 4 at 6.30pm will be quite hilarious. She was truly charming and was kind enough to thank me for my four day sojourn. Eric promised me that I would get on the next series but I suspect that the show will be a big success and there will be thousands more applicants next time and I won't hold him to it. Do watch it when it comes on. I have met all the contestants and there is a great mix of ages,characters and knowledge. And do visit Towneley Hall if you get the chance. It is a superb place run by the local council and houses a fabulous collection that (unfortunately) I didn't get the opportunity to see.



And finally on the subject, a word of praise for the production crew who were, without exception, extremely hospitable. I got to talk to a number of the runners, the make up artist, wardrobe manager, the floor manger and the assistant floor manager and they were all a credit. Mind you, it is an extremely pleasant working environment and a great way to make a living.

Which is how our son Paul earns his money. Paul's show A League Of Their Own is approaching the end of the current series on Sky 1 on Thursday at 9pm. Starring James Corden, the show has been great and Paul emailed me to say that you can now play the game yourself on the Sky website. Give it a try by clicking
here. and see if you can beat my score of 78%.

I'll finish today with a final take on politics. Nice bloke that Alistair Campbell eh.

Our Boomerang Almost Came Back

We had a great evening on Friday when Mark and Nita from Workhouse Marketing joined us for a meal at the Malmaison in Liverpool. It was good to catch up on all their news including the imminent opening of the Whalley Wine Shop in Whalley (where else?)by their son Tom. It's going to be supplying a great range of wines and more and Tom, who once managed the same premises for Thresher, is hoping that his old clients will return and benefit once again from his expertise. With the strength of the Workhouse publicity machine behind him I'm sure that he will make it a great success.



Unfortunately things went downhill the morning after our evening at the Malmaison. Whilst we were having breakfast, a call came through from the factory. Yes I had given Andy the closely guarded secret that is my mobile phone number and told him to phone in case of emergency. We had some of the factory team working overtime to catch up on the backlog of orders that had built up when the circuits were late. So when the phone rang I knew that it was an emergency. Andy told me of a programming problem with the boilers and I couldn't suss it out. So planned day shopping in Liverpool was curtailed as we weren't in the mood for it and we returned early.The nightmare scenario was that three hundred circuits would have to be scrapped. So, after a couple of hours of thinking, I came into the factory and started playing around with the boilers on test. And, guess what? The programme glitch was dead simple, all that was required was for the boilers to be rebooted to accept the new programmes (a bit like when you put a new programme on your computer) and they were all working perfectly. What a relief! I always vowed not to work on Saturdays but now that I no longer own the business, there I was at 6pm.(Chris please note). Thanks to the lads who gave up their time.



I still have a chance to meet Sandi Toksvig. I had a phone call on Friday from a very nice researcher Laura at the BBC and she asked me to come to Manchester for an audition for the show.So tomorrow evening I'm off to the BBC in Oxford Road. I don't really think I stand much chance as, although I know quite a lot about ceramics and Japanese stuff, I don't think I'm up to much on the rest of the antique spectrum.


As part of the audition I have to take a favourite antique with me and talk enthusiastically about it. There are quite a few on a display in the lounge but I'm torn as to which to take as I really like and am enthusiastic about them all.I'll probably take the least valuable as, knowing my luck lately, I'm bound to drop it. And talking of dropped stuff, I just bought a beautiful antique teapot on eBay. The seller said it was in good condition. Now I don't know about you but I don't think that four enormous rivets and a re glued chip on the spout could be defined as "Good condition". The seller was fine and offered a full refund (even saying I could keep the pot if I wanted). I loved the style of his response "hi there ,
to my knowledge [and i m not THE XPERT]it was in good condition.the handle , didn t know , sorry .
to me it s just a teapot .it s eBay .you can t see it , sometimes you are lucky as a buyer , sometimes not .look , i ll send you a full refund if you d b happy that .i m not fussed " sic as they say.

Finally something to shout about at Anfield. I invited my brother Peter to join me but he was unenthusiastic about the prospect of another boring performance so Nick came and saw one of the best goals scored at Anfield for a few seasons.